Argentinean SF

The best known character from Argentinean SF is the Eternauta. Penned by Héctor G. Oesterheld at the end of the 1950s, the main character of the now almost mythical comic embodies the political pathos of the Peronista movement. The first version of the comic has become compulsory reading in high schools across Argentina. However, despite its foundational status, El Eternauta was not the first SF artifact in Argentine culture. On the contrary, Argentina has a long tradition of politically engaged SF whose roots can be found in the 19th Century. Novels like Eduardo L. Holmberg (1852-1937) Viaje maravilloso del Señor Nic Nac (1875) and Dos partidos en lucha. Fantasía científica (1875) underline the emergence of a narrative preoccupied both with social and political issues as well as with scientific advancement and its social and cultural consequences. By the turn of the century, Leopoldo Lugones (1874-1838) would explore such consequences from the perspective of pseudosciences in a book like Las fuerzas extrañas (1906). By 1940, when Adolfo Bioy Casares (1914-1999) published La invención de Morel, Argentine SF enter its mature stage. Yet, critical interest was rare and at times dismissive, confining the modality to a sub-form of the fantastic, destined to blue collar workers and teenagers. It would take another fifty years before a spike in academic interest would produce some of the most interesting approach to the study of SF.

By then, magazines such as El Péndulo, Minotauro and Sinergia had already helped coalesced a very active fandom. El Péndulo, considered by many one of the best SF magazine ever produced worldwide, contributed to cement the popularity of some of the best SF writers in Spanish including Angélica Gorodischer, Carlos Gardini, Ana María Shúa, and Sergio Gaut vel Hartman.

Unfortunately, very few of these works have been translated into English. Aside from Cosmos Latinos (s.below), which is probably the best bet for a non- Spanish teacher, Darrel Lockhart’s Guide can provide suggestions on authors that might be translated as part of fantastic anthologies and mislabeled.

Lecture

This is the lecture “Argentinean SF” by Dr. Silvia Kurlat Ares (Independent Scholar):

Recommended Stories for In-Class Discussion

This is virtually the only compendium of translated short stories from Latin America and includes “only” four short stories from Argentina. Pablo Capanna’s “Acronia” (1966), Eduardo Goligorsky’s “The Last Refuge” (1967), Alberto Vanasco’s “Post-Boomboom” (1967) and Angélica Gorodischer’s “The Violet’s Embryos” (1973). It is a great anthology to start exploration in Argentinian SF but teacher should embrace the option of adding some novels or (if language proficiency allows) original Spanish material.